276. The Reward of Loyalty

In the sixties a worker joined a team of people collecting manure. He was paid one rupee a day. He was young, full of energy, resourceful in work. Soon he became the leader of the group. Agriculture work offers no scope for labourers on daily wage. He was posted as a watchman on the same salary. Communities are known for different attitudes. Families of blacksmiths will be extremely skillful. So are the carpenters to a lesser degree. Certain communities among the working class have distinguished themselves for utter loyalty to the master. Other communities are there where loyalty is of no value. Some other communities set store by pilfering. Perhaps each has its own swabhava.

Luck gravitates to a man who denies himself the privilege of the defects of his family or caste. Great luck is in store for one who exhibits the attitudes of a higher community. This watchman was actuated by a sense of loyalty, a value not espoused by his family. That was his value. That VALUE in him began to translate itself into Prosperity in his life. Loyalty in him was so great that all other defects, errors, and crimes were overcome by this value. He was a leader of men. About forty to fifty people were happy to carry out his behest.

Circumstances changed. His master left the town; he sought other avenues. As he left the town, one of his closest friends, an elderly politician desired to take back the house he had sold to the Master of the watchman. Out of friendship, no document had been made or receipt written. The buyer of the house, out of sheer good manners, had trusted the politician. The politician now had other ideas and wanted the house back as if he had simply rented it. The politician approached this watchman and asked him to use his band of men to vacate the house so that he could take it over. As the watchman had left his Master some years before and was from a community not known for its loyalty, the politician counted on this watchman's help. The loyalty in the watchman reared its head. He not only refused to do the bidding of the politician, but warned him against vacating his former master's house. Years later, news came that that watchman had prospered and is now wealthy, owning a Maruti van.